Literature of Comics & the Graphic Narrative

This week I read Asterios Polp by David Mazzucchelli. I absolutely loved the style of this story and spent so much time admiring the artwork on each and every page. Asterios Polp is a middle-aged architect and teacher, whose life is totally flipped upside down when his New York City apartment goes up in flames. With a determined attitude, he leaves the city and relocates to a small town in the American heartland, and we then begin to learn more about what happened both after and before his apartment was destroyed. However, something I found really interesting is that the story isn’t told by Asterios himself or from a third person perspective, it is told by his deceased twin brother, Ignazio. Also, as the story unfolds, it moves back and forth between the present and the past, and we begin to learn and understand more about Asterios’ character and how he has gotten to the point of where he is now. We are also introduced to Hana, who is a first-generation Japanese A...

This week I read Buddha Volume One by Osamu Tezuka. Buddha is Tezuka’s unique interpretation of the biography of Prine Siffhartha. However, the prince himself isn’t even born until page 264 of Volume One; before that, Tezuka tells the story of the tale of Chapra (a slave) and his pariah friend Tatta (who is able to communicate with animals). This tale is very importrant as it introduces the reader to the brutal caste system in the northern kingdoms. Chapra hides the fact that he was once a slave and rises to become the adopted son of a famous general. But as he attempts to beat the caste system through violence and ambition, he slowly leads himself to his own downfall, as well as the downfall of those that he loves. In volume 2, Siddhartha is equally unhappy with the injustice of the caste system and he seeks his own way to fight it. However, at the end of volume 2, his path leads him away from the palace luxury of his youth and he cuts of his hair and dep...